Asking rents drop at 1 WTC

Durst Organization and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey slash rents by 10% in response to tepid leasing demand.

The owners of One World Trade Center have reduced asking rents to $69 per square foot from $75 for the tower's middle floors just months before it is set to open, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The building is currently 55% leased and is set to open by the end of the year, but not a single private-office tenant has taken space there since roughly 2011. In response the owner, a venture between Douglas Durst's namesake company and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, decided to bring asking rents a little closer to the average for top-quality downtown buildings, which a Cushman & Wakefield report pegs at $53.87 per square foot.

"We have a lot of people looking at the space, but because of the asking rent, we are not able to really put anything over the finish line," Mr. Durst said.

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The leasing troubles come at a time when Larry Silverstein, the developer of One World Trade, is acting on a prior agreement to build two more buildings at the site—though he wants the Port Authority to modify that agreement and guarantee $1.2 billion in debt on 3 World Trade Center. The Port Authority is scheduled to vote on that proposal Wednesday.